Conservatism begins not with a snarl or with a conspiracy theory but with a “thank you.” Conservatism is a posture of the soul: a recognition that we are heirs to a noble inheritance of culture, of institutions, and of morality and ethics. Incredible work, thought and sacrifice by preceding generations has bestowed upon us the richness of Western civilization, of classical liberalism, of the Enlightenment, and of the Judeo-Christian worldview.
In a recent IPI PolicyByte, I referenced the conservative impulse as “gratitude and respect toward those who went before us,” which causes us to pause before making or embracing change. Conservatives aren’t opposed to change per se, but rather insist that we recognize the value of what we have before we tear it down in hopes that something better will emerge.
Progressives reject the past, whereas conservatives appreciate and seek to understand the past, however flawed. The progressive project distinctly substitutes disdain for gratitude, which may explain why so many progressives are so personally unappealing and repugnant.
This is something that the populist right has in common with progressives. They disdain political leaders such as Mitch McConnell and have no gratitude for, for instance, his dogged efforts to place conservative judges on the Supreme Court and on lower courts. They disdain Texas Sen. John Cornyn and ignore his similar efforts. Conservatives, by contrast, can appreciate McConnell’s significant policy accomplishments while also disagreeing with some of his actions and positions.
Again, to Chesterton’s Fence. In his parable, a “modern reformer” comes across a fence, and says “I don’t see the use of this; let’s clear it away.” To which Chesterton replies, the fence obviously did not pop up there naturally, on its own. It was obviously built by intelligent people who must have had some reason for building it. So before tearing it down, let’s investigate why it was built in the first place.
That gratitude is not nostalgia for nostalgia’s sake. It’s realism about the fragility of civilization, and of republics. The progressive temperament assumes if we tear down the old stuff, something better will automatically appear. But conservatives know the jungle grows back. The institutions we inherit—family, markets, churches, constitutional limits—were not assumed. They were paid for in “blood and brains and science and thought and experience,” and we ought to feel a kind of reverent indebtedness for them.
Richard Weaver called this virtue piety, “a discipline of the will through respect,” acknowledging “things larger than the ego.” That’s another way of saying gratitude: the humble admission that I didn’t make the world, I didn’t found the republic, and I don’t get to rewrite human nature on a whim. When conservatives defend limits, they’re not being killjoys; they’re being thankful stewards of an inheritance that we can steward or ruin.
In William F. Buckley’s little book Gratitude, he presses the same point: the blessings of liberty create obligations of love and service, not to a utopian state, but to the country and culture that formed us. Russell Kirk liked to remind us of “the unbought grace of life”—the gifts we didn’t earn but must honor. If you’re grateful for this grace, you don’t embrace radicalism. You insist that government stay in its constitutional lane so families, communities, and free people can do what only they can do.
Gratitude is the heart of conservatism. It’s the moral engine behind our suspicion of Big Government, our love of ordered liberty, and our acceptance and embrace of progress but our insistence that it must say “thank you.”